The Empusium

Reviews

Praise for The Empusium:

“Deft and disturbing. . .  In Antonia Lloyd-Jones’s crisp translation, Tokarczuk tells a folk horror story with a deceptively light and knowing tone. . . elegant and genuinely unsettling.”—Hari Kunzru, The New York Times Book Review

“Pulling from folktales, mythology, art, and literature, Tokarczuk’s novel spins a story that feels eerily familiar and yet totally new… Just when you think you have this novel in your sight, it shimmers into something else entirely.” —The Atlantic
 
“A marvelous reframing of The Magic Mountain … [that] can be enjoyed — and may even be more enjoyable — on its own merits … Lloyd-Jones’s uniformly excellent translation of The Empusium is a much breezier read." —Boston Globe
 
“Tokarczuk masterfully maps out a new kind of horror story, one that weaves together elements of folklore and feminist allegory.”—Harper’s Bazaar

“In Tokarczuk’s hands, the staid genre of the bildungsroman erupts with sinister possibility…. A grand fantasy of revenge …taut, febrile.”—Washington Post
 
“A novel that in Tokarczuk’s dexterous hands transcends its own limits, further cementing the Nobel laureate as one of the most original storytellers of our age. Equipped with only our measly five senses, it leaves us questioning — just like her characters — what might be hiding in plain sight.”—Financial Times
 
“A magnificently haunting portrayal of health, death, and all that comes in between, The Empusium is one of Tokarczuk’s best works to date.” —Chicago Review of Books

"An odd, fascinating book—a blackly serious joke—from an author of great daring and intelligence…. What stands out most is the philosophical conflict it stages between rationality and folk belief. This is the thread that runs through all of Ms. Tokarczuk’s wildly various books.”—Wall Street Journal

“A mischievous fairy tale about transformation, emotion and ambiguity…Tokarczuk keeps the suspense at a low boil throughout, balancing moments of terror and revulsion... Until the horror and the beauty can no longer be contained, that is, and erupt into the novel’s utterly sublime conclusion. As ever, Tokarczuk’s prose — and Antonia Lloyd-Jones’ glorious translation … — will knock the wind out of you.… The Empusium asks: If bigotry and violence make up the bedrock of our cultural traditions, can we still teach ourselves new ways of seeing and thinking? If we squint hard enough, can we find the women and other unpersons hidden in the past — and the present?”—San Francisco Chronicle

“This rich gothic novel set in 1913 is certainly haunted, but also rife with social commentary on gender dysphoria, inequality, and prejudice. Readers will come for the eerie atmosphere but stay for the searing critique of society's tendency to discard its most vulnerable if it means maintaining a semblance of safety.”—Booklist

“The Polish Nobel winner ladles up a deliciously creepy revenge tale in this satirical spin on Thomas Mann’s 100-year-old masterpiece The Magic Mountain.”—The Guardian

“Olga Tokarczuk’s deft, dark satirical wit is on full display in The Empusium, which challenges the rigid patriarchal world of pre-WWI Europe with horror and humor.”—BookPage

“The gothic elements keep the blood stirring.”—Library Journal

“Reckons with some of the major intellectual questions of the 20th century while simultaneously spinning a mysterious—and spooky—web of intrigue and suspense. A crucial addition to Tokarczuk’s oeuvre.” —Kirkus, STARRED review

“Tokarczuk concocts a potent blend of horror tropes and literary references (Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann) as she realizes the potential of her tale’s uncommon setting—a community set apart by the omnipresence of sickness and death, where the rules of civilized propriety give way to more fantastic possibilities. Readers will find much to savor.” —Publishers Weekly

“Historical fiction threaded through with a playful kind of literary horror, The Empusium . . . is in part a wry response to Thomas Mann’s classic The Magic Mountain, blending high philosophy with dark comedy, strange folklore, and hallucinogenic liquors.”—Goodreads, “Most Anticipated Boos of the Fall”
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